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Showing papers in "Psychological Review in 1974"


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: It is argued that the data on several types of acquired motivation, arising from either pleasurable or aversive stimulation, can be fruitfully reorganized and understood within the framework provided by the opponent-process model.
Abstract: A new theory of motivation is described along with its applications to addiction and aversion. The theory assumes that many hedonic, affective, or emotional states are automatically opposed by central nervous system mechanisms which reduce the intensity of hedonic feelings, both pleasant and aversive. The opponent processes for most hedonic states are strengthened by use and are weakened by disuse. These simple assumptions lead to deductions of many known facts about acquired motivation. In addition, the theory suggests several new lines of research on motivation. It argues that the establishment of some types of acquired motivation does not depend on conditioning and is nonassociative in nature. The relationships between conditioning processes and postulated opponent processes are discussed. Finally, it is argued that the data on several types of acquired motivation, arising from either pleasurable or aversive stimulation, can be fruitfully reorganized and understood within the framework provided by the opponent-process model.

1,549 citations



Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, it is argued that the nomothetic assumptions of the traditional research paradigm are incorrect and that by adopting some of the idiographic assumptions employed by our intuitions, higher cross-situational correlation coefficients can be obtained.
Abstract: The historically recurring controversy over the existence of cross-situational consistencies in behavior is sustained by the discrepancy between our intuitions, which affirm their existence, and the research literature, which does not. It is argued that the nomothetic assumptions of the traditional research paradigm are incorrect and that by adopting some of the idiographic assumptions employed by our intuitions, higher cross-situational correlation coefficients can be obtained. A study is reported which shows that it is possible to identify on a priori grounds those individuals who will be crosssituationally consistent and those who will not, and it is concluded that not only must personality assessment attend to situations—as has been recently urged—but to persons as well.

1,272 citations



Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors proposed a model which describes dyadic social interactions in terms of complementary proportions of those underlying dimensions, where opposites appear at 180° angles whereas complementary behaviors appear at topologically similar positions on two separate planes.
Abstract: A brief review of the literature on structural analysis of interpersonal behavior is followed by a proposal which draws heavily from prior models, especially those of Schaefer and of Leary. The proposed model goes beyond previous ones in that it has a highly explicit structure which defines behavioral opposites, complements, and antidotes. Built on two axes named affiliation and interdependence, the model describes dyadic social interactions in terms of complementary proportions of those underlying dimensions. Opposite behaviors appear at 180° angles whereas complementary behaviors appear at topologically similar positions on two separate planes. Antidotes are defined as opposites of complements. Using the questionnaire method, the proposed structure has been tested by the responses of normal as well as psychiatric subjects. Analysis of these data by the techniques of autocorrelation, circumplex analysis, and factor analysis supports the model.

1,004 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
Katherine Nelson1
TL;DR: This article proposed a conceptual model to account for the child's initial translation of meanings into words, which is based on the assumption that the young child translates the dynamic functional relations of objects into conceptual core meanings to which identificational features of concept instances are attached.
Abstract: Proposes a conceptual model to account for the child's initial translation of meanings into words. The model is discussed in terms of the characteristics of word acquisition and of the relation between 1st words and 1st sentences. While concept formation theory, semantic feature theory, and Piagetian theory are each alone inadequate to account for this process, each makes a necessary contribution to an adequate solution. The resulting model rests on the assumption that the young child translates the dynamic functional relations of objects into conceptual “core” meanings to which identificational features of concept instances are attached. It differentiates between the meaning of a concept and its referents and relates these to concept generation and concept identification, respectively. Some wider implications of the model for acquiring concepts and general semantic categories and for constructing sentences are briefly considered. (51 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved)

629 citations



Journal ArticleDOI

598 citations




Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, an alternative approach to the prediction of performance is developed which follows Premack in relating instrumental performance to empirical measures of operant behavior, and it is concluded that instrumental performance is not determined by a probability differential in operant baseline between the instrumental and contingent responses, but by the condition of response deprivation.
Abstract: The empirical law of effect is criticized as an incomplete step in the development of empirical laws of instrumental performance. An alternate approach to the prediction of performance is developed which follows Premack in relating instrumental performance to empirical measures of operant behavior. However, it is concluded that instrumental performance is not determined by a probability differential in operant baseline between the instrumental and contingent responses, but by the condition of response deprivation. This condition depends on the terms of the schedule as well as operant baseline measures. The response deprivation condition occurs in a contingency if, in performing the instrumental response at operant baseline, the subject would perform less than his operant baseline of the contingent response. Instrumental performance appears directly related to the amount of response deprivation. Response selection and the application of the response deprivation approach are discussed.


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: A model for the recognition of tachistoscopically presented words is developed and it is shown that under certain simplifying assumptions this sophisticated guessing model is isomorphic with the "criterion bias" model as developed in 1967 by Broadbent.
Abstract: A model for the recognition of tachistoscopically presented words is developed. The model is a \"sophisticated guessing\" model which takes explicit account of the geometry of the characters which make up the words or letter strings. Explicit attempts are made to account for word frequency effects, effects due to letter transition probabilities, and effects due to physical similarity of character strings to one another. A word recognition experiment using the set of three-letter words is reported, and the model is used to make quantitative predictions of these results as well as to give a qualitative account for a number of results in the literature. Finally, it is shown that under certain simplifying assumptions this sophisticated guessing model is isomorphic with the \"criterion bias\" model as developed in 1967 by Broadbent. The process whereby words are recognized has long fascinated experimental psy-Several related findings have commanded the most attention. For example, more letters per unit time may be apprehended when a word is presented than when a string of unrelated letters is presented (Huey, 1908). A letter string formed by taking a word and either deleting or replacing one or two letters is often clearly perceived as that word (Pillsbury, 1897). Other things being equal, words which occur frequently in the language are more easily perceived than those which occur less frequently (Goldia-The more the statistics of letter strings approximate those of words, the better the perception of the letter strings (cf. Miller, Bruner, & Postman , 1954). The more predictable a word is within a sentence, the more easily it is Most explanations of these phenomena suggest that they all result from the fact that the subject combines internally provided information about language with externally provided information from the sensory system (cf. Morton, 1969, 1970). By this argument, words are easier to see than nonwords because we can apply our knowledge of the vocabulary of the language. Knowledge of relative frequencies of words in the language allows us to read high-frequency words more readily. Knowledge of syntactic and semantic relations allows us to read words more easily in the context of 99











Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The data and analysis suggest that the efferent command for smooth pursuit eye movement, at the stage where it is monitored, contains good information about the direction of movement but only crude information about speed.
Abstract: Precise measurement of the position of the eye as it follows a moving target makes possible the exact computation of retinal information about the path of movement of that target. Comparing this retinal information with the reported visual perception of the path of movement enables inferences to be made concerning what information about eye position was used by the perceptual system. On the assumption that information available to the perceptual system about eye position comes only from monitoring efferent commands, these inferences are also about the content of those commands. Our data and analysis suggest that the efferent command for smooth pursuit eye movement, at the stage where it is monitored, contains good information about the direction of movement but only crude information about speed.



Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The extent to which preparatory processes are selective between two performance measures, speed and accuracy, within a processing stage, for example, stimulus encoding and response execution, and among possible stimulus presentation times is examined.
Abstract: This paper examines the extent to which preparatory processes are selective (a) between two performance measures, speed and accuracy, (b) within a processing stage, for example, stimulus encoding and response execution, and (c) among possible stimulus presentation times. It is shown that the appearance of selectivity between speed and accuracy depends on whether these variables are considered over the possible preparatory states on a given trial, over the trials within an experimental condition, or over different conditions, and the relevance of this result to the measurement of processing capacity is discussed. Selectivity within processing stages is demonstrated by applying a parametric processing model to data from letter-matching tasks in which the identity of the first letter is probabilistically related to that of the second letter. In these tasks, reaction time differences between physical and name matches and between same and different responses depend on the stimulus and response contingencies and on the stimulus presentation times. Finally, a method is presented for resolving observed error rates into components that reflect the accuracy of each processing stage.